Bill Sherk - Old Car Detective: Favourite Stories, 1925 to 1965

Old Car Detective

Favourite Stories, 1925 to 1965

Old Car Detective

Favourite Stories, 1925 to 1965

Bill Sherk

Copyright Bill Sherk, 2011

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise (except for brief passages for purposes of review) without the prior permission of Dundurn Press. Permission to photocopy should be requested from Access Copyright.

Editor: Shannon Whibbs

Design: Jesse Hooper

Printer: Webcom

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Sherk, Bill, 1942

Old car detective: favourite stories, 1925-1965 / Bill Sherk.

ISBN 978-1-55488-905-1

1. Automobiles--Humor. 2. Automobiles--Anecdotes. I. Title.

1 2 3 4 5 15 14 13 12 11

All images have either been donated to the author or come from his personal collection unless otherwise noted.

We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program. We also acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund and Livres Canada Books, and the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Book Publishers Tax Credit program, and the Ontario Media Development Corporation.

Care has been taken to trace the ownership of copyright material used in this book. The author and the publisher welcome any information enabling them to rectify any references or credits in subsequent editions.

J. Kirk Howard, President

Printed and bound in Canada.
www.dundurn.com

Dundurn Press

3 Church Street, Suite 500

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

M5E 1M2

Gazelle Book Services Limited

White Cross Mills

High Town, Lancaster, England

LA1 4XS

Dundurn Press

2250 Military Road

Tonawanda, NY

U.S.A. 14150

To Lady Catherine,
the love of my life.
Her patience and encouragement
made this book a reality.

Contents

BY BILL GAY

Foreword by Bill Gay

When Bill Sherk told me about his latest work, I knew it would be greeted by a whole new generation of vintage automotive enthusiasts. For many, this book could be their first exposure to the man that many, including myself, deem to be Canadas leading authority on old cars and the people who drive them. While Bill Sherk is without doubt a gifted writer and storyteller, he is also a good listener. So when he meets the owners of these cars, he is sure to give them his complete and undivided attention. This skill becomes apparent in this new book because, in fact, he is writing about people as much as their vehicles. Just ask him to tell you about the cars he has owned over the years.

To say that he comes from an automotive background is an under-statement. Sherk grew up in the town of Leamington, situated just an hours drive from Detroit, still the capital of the Big Three automakers: General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler. While still in high school, he landed his first summer job at the local Pontiac-Buick dealership, washing cars on their used car lot. He also pumped gasoline at an Esso station in Toronto while attending university. Having spent a good deal of his working life as a history teacher, he now devotes his full attention to writing about the cars that have shaped the economic and social history of Canada.

I recently saw him driving a 1962 Plymouth convertible through Leamington on a sunny day, test-driving, if you will, the story of the car and its owner for his syndicated newspaper column that now reaches over five hundred thousand readers each week. He has also been a feature writer for Old Autos for twenty years and is co-host of The Auto Stop, a popular local TV show where his great sense of humour attracts not only car lovers, but also all those people who love the cars that have served as guideposts for the special times in their lives.

So enjoy Old Car Detective: Favourite Stories, 1925 to 1965, brought to you by the man himself, Bill Sherk.

Bill Gay has been active in the marketing of cars at the retail level. His media career takes in forty-five years in radio, print, and television. He and Bill Sherk have assisted with such automotive events as the Essex Cruise Night and the Heinz Ketchup Cruise. He and Sherk co-host The Auto Stop, a popular local TV show about cars and the people who own them.

With Special Thanks

I owe a big debt of thanks to many people who made this book a reality. My editor Shannon Whibbs guided the manuscript through all the steps from my computer disk to the book you are now reading (I was her history teacher in high school!). I also thank Kirk Howard, Beth Bruder, Jesse Hooper, Tammy Mavroudi, and the whole gang at Dundurn Press in Toronto for giving me the opportunity to write another book about old cars and the stories behind them.

Some great stories have no photo to go with them, and in those cases, Ken McGee is the man to see. Located in Goderich, Ontario, McGee operates what is probably Canadas largest collection of automotive literatureand every piece in that collection is for sale. My good friend Ron Pickford told me the hilarious story of an oil-burning 1947 Hudson (see ), but took no photos of it when he owned it over fifty years ago. At times like this, I phone Ken McGee at 519-524-5821 and ask Josh or Nicola if they have an original 1947 Hudson sales brochure, from which I could obtain the photo I need. Nine times out of ten, the answer is yes and the item is put in the mail to me the same day.

To the folks at Zippy Print here in my hometown of Leamington, Ontario, how could I ever put this book together without you? To Rob and Sherry Wenzler and to Bradley Collison, many thanks for scanning and emailing photos to our computersometimes a dozen or more at a time, and always at 300 dpi. Bradley often has to enhance the photos by removing fold lines or background details, and Im always amazed at watching him perform his artistry on the screen.

I offer my heartfelt thanks to all the friends and readers who sent me their stories, to all the editors who carry my Old Car Detective column in their newspapers, and to all the people behind the scenes, including Bob Cartlidge, Scott Holland, Vern Kipp, Jodi Kish and the gang at Old Autos, Alan Paterson, and Mark Ribble. A very special thank you goes to my good friend Bill Gay for writing such an eloquent foreword to this book. I have dedicated my book to Lady Catherine, the love of my life, whose patience and proofreading carried me to the finish line!

Introduction

This book really got started fifty-two years ago when I bought my first car. I was seventeen and still in high school and couldnt afford a new car so I bought an old car. It was built two years before I was born and had no engine. I had to push it home, but I was very proud of it because it was my first car: a tomato-red 1940 Mercury convertible.